RIVERSIDE COUNTY: Some departments not consolidating IT services

The Riverside County’s district attorney’s office and county auditor have declined to participate in a consolidation of the county’s computer systems intended to save tens of millions of dollars.

County Supervisor Kevin Jeffries on Tuesday, April 9, asked for a list of departments that opted not to undergo an assessment by the information technology department to see what savings could be achieved through consolidation. The county wants to merge IT functions to eliminate redundancies and reduce costs.

In a January report to supervisors, Chief Information Officer Kevin Crawford wrote that some of the services provided by the 700 or so technology workers appear to be duplicative.

“Because of the divisions of effort, it has made it more difficult for departments to share information, collaborate and cooperate,” he wrote.

County Executive Officer Jay Orr has said consolidation could save $40 million to $60 million in the next few years. It’s not clear how much of those savings would apply to the county’s general fund, which pays for the bulk of county services.

The county is exploring various ways to cut costs and boost revenue in the face of millions of dollars’ worth of new, ongoing expenses, including raises guaranteed to employees in exchange for pension concessions, and new jail beds to stem the tide of early prisoner releases.

Merging IT services is “a very critical cost-savings effort that needs to move forward … in a rapid manner given our budget concerns,” said Jeffries, who took office in January.

He added that while he understands departments may be concerned about consolidation, “for any department to actually decline or even refuse to allow an assessment to be done, that just sends up all kinds of red flags.”

In his report, Crawford wrote that departments overseen by elected officials, such as the Sheriff’s Department, district attorney, assessor/county clerk/recorder and auditor/controller, had the option of whether to get an IT assessment and whether to take part in the consolidation.

Auditor/Controller Paul Angulo’s office did an assessment but declined to take part in the consolidation, county spokesman Ray Smith said Wednesday.

Angulo said the IT specialists in his office cost thousands of dollars to train and can’t be easily replaced.

“There’s nothing but risk in this department,” he said. “At any one time we’re sending $100 million out. We need to make sure our folks know exactly what they’re doing.”

The IT consolidation actually would cost his office more, Angulo added.

“What they’re trying to do is one-size-fits-all,” he said. “But it doesn’t fit the auditor/controller operations.”

The office of District Attorney Paul Zellerbach declined to participate in the assessment, Smith said.

In an email, district attorney spokesman John Hall wrote: “The consolidation as defined by (county IT) did not meet the unique needs of the District Attorney’s Office at this time.

“This decision does not, however, preclude the DA’s Office from possibly taking part in future such assessments.”

Assessor/County Clerk/Recorder Larry Ward said his department completed the assessment and is evaluating its options.

If his department does take part in consolidation, Ward said he wants to make sure he gets the same level of IT service he has now.

“When we have system problems, I’ve got IT people I can call on (and) they’re there,” he said. “If I turn that responsibility over to somebody else, I would need to make sure that my service level agreement was such that if my (document) recording system went down, I could have (IT) there in 10 minutes.”

The IT consolidation has also faced resistance from one of the county’s labor unions.

In January, a lawyer for Laborers’ International Union of North America Local 777 complained that IT workers being transferred as part of the consolidation were losing seniority rights. Smith said at the time he expected the union’s concerns would be resolved.

And so far, the Board of Supervisors clerk has not agreed to an assessment, according to Crawford.

The clerk position currently held by Kecia Harper-Ihem is appointed by supervisors. The clerk’s office decided not to do an assessment based on comments made by supervisors at one of their meetings, Smith said. He did not have further details.